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In western Myanmar, conflict creates new dangers for women

September 27, 2021

Read Time:1 Minute, 41 Second

Khine Thu fled her home in Myanmar’s northwestern Sagaing region for the first time in June, running into the jungle as soldiers stormed her village. She has lost count of how many times she has fled since, but thinks it may now be about 15.

“Whenever we hear soldiers coming, we run,” she said. “We escape into the forest, and we come back to the village when the soldiers are gone.”

As armed resistance to the February 1 military coup increases, the military rulers have responded with violent crackdowns on entire villages, mirroring a “four-cuts” strategy which it has honed for more than 60 years in the country’s restive border areas.

Since April, the Sagaing region has been a stronghold of resistance, and also a hotspot for deadly military incursions.

A total of 109 people have been killed in the region since July, according to a report Myanmar’s National Unity Government (NUG) submitted to the United Nations Human Rights Council on September 19.

Among the victims are 73 people from Depayin and Kani townships, where mass killings were documented by human rights groups and local media in July. Those killed, including fighters and civilians, were all men, but as security forces maintain a presence in the area’s villages, women are living with the consequences of conflict on a daily basis. This month, the military blocked the internet in 10 townships in the Sagaing region, including Kani, adding to fears the military could intensify its attacks.

The violence started in Khine Thu’s village of Satpyarkyin in Depayin township on June 14, when soldiers opened fire and killed one person the day after two daughters of a military-appointed administrator were found dead in a nearby village.

Soldiers returned on July 2; the ensuing clashes left at least 32 local people dead amid indiscriminate shelling and small arms fire, according to the NUG’s report, while the media outlet Myanmar Now reported that 10,000 people from eleven villages fled their homes.

source: Aljazeera